In Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won't Go Away, Rebecca Newberger Goldstein offers some rather illuminating insight into why the same philosophy that was espoused by the ancient Greeks has survived these few millennia past the dark ages and the age of enlightenment, past the existentialists wearing big black shoes and speaking French for no apparent reason, and into today's curriculum for anyone who is looking to gain an understanding of philosophy in general.

Over two-thirds of the book are spent telling the story of the dead and the dying, introducing and then killing his characters over the course of a few pages until it felt like you were reading an obituary while the more important characters watched from a safe distance.